Mr. POFF. So you still have quota areas and the President would still have the authority to waive the 10-percent limitation. Mr. ROGERS. Yes; that is right. Mr. POFF. Now do you mind explaining why you felt it necessary, if you regard the quota system itself as inherent evil, to continue the system of quota areas in your bill? Mr. ROGERS. First of all, the objective being that the quota system is something that is understood with the rest of the world and those desiring to immigrate understand that, that if you pull the rug, so to speak, out and stop them, then you may, as I tried to explain a moment ago, get into that area where some instances may arise from an international standpoint that the President should have some authority to adjust and take care of. Mr. POFF. I appreciate all the gentleman has said, and I don't mean to be disrespectful, but your answer is not responsive to my question. Mr. ROGERS. I am sorry I have not made it clear. Mr. POFF. Does that mean the gentleman does not choose to respond? Mr. ROGERS. I have responded. Mr. POFF. You have not responded in a responsive way. My question is, If you feel that the quota system itself is an inherent evil, then why does your bill perpetuate the system of quota areas? Mr. ROGERS. Wait a minute. You and I have practiced law a long time. Mr. POFF. Are you going to answer the question responsively? Mr. ROGERS. Yes. First of all, you say that I assume that the quota system is evil. I never assumed such. Mr. POFF. Well, you are abolishing it. Mr. ROGERS. But the fact that you abolish and substitute something in place thereof, does that make the thing that has been in existence for all these years an evil? Mr. POFF. I am asking you that question? Mr. ROGERS. No. Mr. POFF. Is it evil or is it not? Mr. ROGERS. It is not. Mr. POFF. All right. Now why do you continue the system of quota area even though you want to abolish the quota system? Mr. ROGERS. I have tried. Now let's get this straight so that you, I hope, understand it. Mr. POFF. I believe I am capable of understanding it if you will answer that question. Mr. ROGERS. Then the answer, as I understand it, is that if you give the President the authority in this 10-percent area that you are talking about, in the event there should arise in the future some foreign country who feels that under this quota system that has been in existence heretofore-do you follow me-who still feel that perhaps by the change of this system you may have offended or set aside the relations between the two, and that if the President has this authority he may move in and make sure that the incident does not hurt the United States. Now that is my reason or my understanding of why it is there. 36-382-64-pt. 1——7 Mr. POFF. Then as I understand your question-maybe, as you suggested, I am not capable of understanding it. Mr. ROGERS. No. Mr. POFF. But as I understand it, what you are saying is that your bill is designed to become an instrument of foreign policy. Mr. ROGERS. Well, let's put it this way. Everything dealing with immigration and all relations with other countries has some effect on that country and on this country. Now what is foreign policy? If you want to get specific, isn't it the understanding that each nation has with each other as it may relate to trade, education, and things of that nature so that we can get along and maintain the peace of the world without brush fires jumping up here and there and trying to promote Mr. POFF. I can't dispute what the gentleman says, but, of course, you realize that a quota area sometimes includes more than one nation, and that is the one thing that has been criticized most bitterly by those that feel that reform in our present law is necessary, but I understand you to feel that these quota areas as now constituted should be maintained. Mr. ROGERS. Well, the bill does not do that. Mr. POFF. It does not maintain them in their present boundaries? Mr. ROGERS. Well, what this does, it puts the quotas in this pool but it makes this authorization. Mr. POFF. In places the limitation of 10 percent. Mr. ROGERS. Yes. Mr. POFF. And gives the President the power to waive the 10percent restriction. Mr. ROGERS. Yes. Mr. POFF. But this quota area system will continue to obtain after the 5-year period has expired, will it not? Mr. ROGERS. Yes. Now, wait a minute. It is my understanding that it would take and put it all at the end of the 5 years. It all goes into this pool. Mr. POFF. That is true but that specific limitation, referring to a quota area, still obtains after the 5-year period has expired does it not? Mr. ROGERS. As I tried to explain, yes. The answer is "Yes" to your question. Mr. MOORE. Mr. Chairman, I regain the floor here to say I think we certainly appreciate the statement of the gentleman from Colorado and we probably want to inquire of him further. I want the record to show that in the hypothetical question that I posed to him on the total immigration being 600,000 in order to emphasize the relationship of total immigration to quota immigration in the United States, that was purely hypothetical and did not decide in any way that that was the total immigration in the country. I gave that set of facts in such a way as to paint for the gentleman that the quota system only represented one-third of our total immigration. I don't want to mislead the gentleman in any way in that respect. Mr. ROGERS. I am sorry because I got the impression from the statement that you made that over 600,000 people were admitted each year and two-thirds of them Mr. MOORE. I was using that only as a hypothetical figure. Actually, it is only one-half of that. The total immigration is 300,000 and the number of quota entries is approximately 100,000. I was escalating a little bit to make your mathematics a little easier to receive as I threw them from this side of the aisle. Mr. ROGERS. As you threw them from that side of the aisle I understood it to mean the actual figure. Mr. MOORE. I did not. Mr. ROGERS. That is what confused me. Mr. MOORE. I don't think it confused you too much, because your answers would have been the same had I reduced it on a 1-to-3 basis and there was not any confusion in the record as to your answers. Mr. ROGERS. No, I hope not. Mr. MOORE. But there may have been a confusion in the record that I represented the total annual immigration as being 600,000. Mr. Chairman, having said that, I move we adjourn. Mr. FEIGHAN. The subcommittee will adjourn until 10 o'clock Monday morning, and we will be very happy to have you with us, Mr. Rogers. Mr. ROGERS. You want me to return Monday morning at 10 o'clock? I will be most happy to be here. (Whereupon, at 12:40 p.m., the committee recessed, to reconvene at 10 a.m. Monday, June 22, 1964.) TO AMEND THE IMMIGRATION AND NATIONALITY ACT MONDAY, JUNE 22, 1964 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE No. 1 OF THE The subcommittee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10 a.m. in room 346, Cannon House Office Building, the Honorable Michael A. Feighan (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Representatives Feighan, Poff, Chelf, Moore, and Rodino. Also present: Walter M. Besterman, legislative assistant, and Garner J. Cline, associate counsel. Mr. FEIGHAN. The subcommittee will come to order. We resume the testimony today on pending immigration legislation with our able colleague, Congressman Byron G. Rogers, First Congressional District of Colorado, continuing his testimony from last Friday, June 19. At the outset, I would like to clarify a point in our hearings of last Friday. When a question was raised as to whether our colleague, Congressman Byron Rogers, would be able to return today in the event he did not complete his testimony on Friday, he stated he would be happy to do so, but-and I quote "not to the point of harrassment or intimidation of that nature." I would like to inquire of our able and esteemed colleague just what he meant by "harrassment or intimidation." Did you infer that this subcommittee has harassed or intimidated any Member or any witness? STATEMENT OF HON. BYRON G. ROGERS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF COLORADO (Resumed) Mr. ROGERS. As far as I am concerned, after you read into the record the letters that you wrote to the chairman and his response. thereto, and when I stated to you that the chairman agreed that he would return here and discuss this matter, then if the senior Member, chairman of the committee, is then criticized because he did not return here and testify as you may have found convenient to yourself, I do not know what may happen in that instance and, therefore, I placed the reservation that I did. It is not necessary for me to be harassed by this subcommittee. Mr. FEIGHAN. Explain that. Just what do you mean by harrassment? Mr. ROGERS. All right. You and I know that it took exactly 10 years or more to rewrite the Immigration and Nationality Act that was approved in 1952, the Walter-McCarran Act. |